What we desperately shut our minds to is once again being pronounced ever more clearly: climate change is here; it is already bringing devastating extreme weather events; it will become worse in the years to come. In late September, part 1 of the fifth assessment report (AR5) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was released in Stockholm.

President Obama yesterday gave the most important speech on climate change in his tenure so far. In the words of Al Gore, it was the best “by any president ever”. It is a different matter that all the big cable news operators in the US chose to ignore this speech.

Between June 3 and 14, the latest round of climate negotiations will take place at Bonn, Germany. Three bodies that carry out the work of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change are meeting to negotiate on various issues. Following its first meeting in Bonn less than a month ago, ADP-2 will resume its work along with the regular annual session of SBI and SBSTA (SB38).

New deal must not attempt to rewrite or reinterpret the Convention, say developing countries

By: Indrajit Bose, Bonn

The second session of the ADP, acronym for Ad hoc Working Group on Durban Platform, began in Bonn on April 29, 2013. At the opening session, countries outlined their positions on what they expect of the global deal on climate change, to be decided in 2015 and which will be implemented from 2020 (see box: Country positions).